Of Food Fairies and Capers
by FangIsFexcellent
Summary: What happens when John and Sherlock attempt to make pizza. Established-relationship, shameless, cotton-candy fluff. Cowritten with another user.


**A bit of established-relationship Johnlock fluff based on the prompt "pizza" given to me. These two will be the death of me, I swear to it.**

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><p>"Please tell me you're not actually considering putting that in food."<p>

"Why? They're completely edible. All of them. Yes, even the funny-looking fish."

"Look, Sherlock, if I can't tell what it is I don't want to put in on pizza. Sorry, but…I just don't."

"Capers, caviar, smelt, alfalfa…they're all perfectly palatable, and rather delicious. What, you've never had them?"

John drops his head into his hands and draws his fingers across his brow. "No, Sherlock, I have never had them."

"Then what _do _you eat on it?"

"The normal stuff, you know…cheese, sausage maybe. Bit of peppers, onions, whatever…"

"Dull."

"You use that adjective for everything from sex to pizza toppings."

"It's an accurate one."

John looks away from his flatmate-slash-boyfriend, focusing intently on the large mass of pale, blobby dough he's in the process of kneading.

"Are you sure you're doing that right?"

"Yes, Sherlock, I am, I am." John scoops a bit of flour from the slightly chipped bowl at his right hand and sprinkles it on the dough, continuing to knead, pushing the dough against the worktop. "Can you get me the sauce? In the fridge?"

"Of course."

"It's not touched any…human bits, has it?"

"…"

"Just give it to me."

Sherlock hands John the large glass bottle of store-bought Ragu. "This looks like vomit," he announces grandly. "Vomit someone produces after eating large quantities of tomatoes."

"Thanks, Sherlock, yes, thanks for that mental image. Shut up and open it for me; my hands are sticky." Sour-faced, Sherlock does.

Still refusing to meet Sherlock's eyes, John slowly and evenly spreads the goopy mix over the soon-to-be pizza, ignoring Sherlock's exaggerated and very fake gagging noises from the corner. "Quiet in the peanut gallery," he says. "Shush. You could help, you know."

"I am helping."

"No, you're not, you're standing over there making crude remarks about every ingredient you didn't buy. Now, come help me get this onto the pan."

"Should have put it on the pan to begin with."

"Quiet, you."

Eventually, the cheese is spread, the pizza is, without too much damage, deposited onto the waiting pan, and Sherlock manages to convince John to add a few of the capers, which were the least-offensive-looking things Sherlock had purchased. The oven's preheated and everything seems to be going well.

"The oven's too hot. It's going to burn."

"Not if we watch it."

"How long does it take to cook?"

"Fifteen minutes?"

"That's an awfully long time to be bored watching pizza cook."

"Shush," John admonishes Sherlock for the fourth or fifth time in the past five minutes, though of course he doesn't mean it. "Now move away from the sink, you. I've got to wash my hands."

He assumes that Sherlock will move once he gets over there, but no. As soon as John is within an acceptable distance, Sherlock's upon him.

"God, stop it!" John laughs as he turns his head, so Sherlock's lips hit his jaw instead of his mouth. "Stop, you're going to get all…flour-y."

"Don't care." His next attempt does not miss, and John completely forgets about the floury dough-mix on his hands as he reaches up to cup Sherlock's cheek. He feels Sherlock make a tiny face as flour drifts down onto his shirt collar, but it's quickly in the past. Powdery handprints stain the back of Sherlock's button-down.

"You taste like mozzarella," Sherlock mutters. "You've been sampling the cheese."

"So what if I have? It's my only chance to actually _taste _it, what with all the gross stuff you piled on top."

"Capers are not gross," Sherlock murmurs, catching John's mouth with his own again. "They're delicious."

"Is it too much of a line to say, so are you?"

"No."

John notices in a dazed sort of way that Sherlock's arm is wrapped protectively around his waist. The detective's other hand is rubbing small circles just below his jawline. It feels nice. Very much so. John breaks the kiss to tell Sherlock so.

"Not good?" asks the very put out sounding detective.

"No. Not not good. Um…I mean. Very good. Very, really good." He laughs, suddenly, and Sherlock draws back just enough for John to see the confused expression on his face. "No…it's just…Jesus Christ, I'm snogging you in our kitchen, Sherlock Holmes."

"Your observation skills are improving."

"Don't be facetious."

"Might I remind you that you've also snogged me on a bed, in the living room, in a taxi, in Lestrade's office, in the tube, in a lift, in another lift, in at least three different victims' bathrooms…"

"Sherlock?"

"Yes."

John's going to say something terribly romantic, like "Shut up and kiss me," but he's distracted by a faint, insistent beeping noise. For the life of him, he can't remember what's beeping, nor why it should be beeping at this particular moment.

He's almost decided to ignore it, reach back up and bury his messy hands in Sherlock's curls, but for the smell that's pervading the air.

They realize at the same moment.

"Shit!" John swears, releasing Sherlock and throwing the oven open. The pizza's completely charred, cheese congealing on the pan (which, John realizes too late, they didn't grease). The capers are crispy and blackened; the sauce now resembling vomit even more.

"Delicious," Sherlock remarks dryly from behind John as he uses two dishtowels to maneuver the pan out of the oven.

"Shut up. Turn the smoke alarm off, will you? It's going to drive me mad in a minute." John pokes feebly at the burned mess. A caper crumbles to ashy dust at his touch.

"There's a Chinese restaurant that's still open at this hour. They do takeaway," John suggests as Sherlock stands on a chair in order to reach the smoke alarm.

"Can we leave the pizza on Anderson's doorstep?" Sherlock inquires, only half joking, as he pokes at the shrieking device on the ceiling. After the noise, the silence that follows rings in their ears.

"He'd know it was you."

"Would he, though? Wouldn't put it past him to blame the food fairies."

"No, Sherlock. Not good."

This is the closest to petulant Sherlock's ever been. "But…we could add 'Anderson's flat' to the list of 'places we've snogged in.'"

"Do you really want to…"

Sherlock realizes what he's said. "Ugh, no. It probably smells like…stupid."

"Why don't you throw the pizza out while I go get that Chinese takeaway I mentioned?"

Sherlock doesn't respond, but he doesn't disagree, so John washes his hands clean and puts on his coat. "Be back in a few, alright?"

"Mm." Sherlock's distracted already, poking at the crisped crust, realizing John's gone exactly the moment the door slams behind him. He looks down at his ruined shirt, laughing to himself, and tosses the pizza, pan and all, into the bin. Better change before John gets back.

After what seems to Sherlock an interminable length of time, the door slams open. "Food fairies are here," John announces. He enters 221B, red and white takeaway bag in hand, to find his flatmate sprawled on the couch, one of Mrs. Hudson's blankets around his shoulders.

"Come, bring it here," Sherlock says, one of his bouts of laziness apparently upon him. John sighs but complies, spreading the boxes of meat, vegetables, and rice across the coffee table.

"I'll get the trays," John says, opening cabinets as he speaks. Sherlock's moved them. Yet again. He finds a nose (preserved, luckily, in what looks like formaldehyde), a bag of mixed biscuits, and a few bottles of chemicals he doesn't even touch before he finally locates the eat-on trays.

He arranges the boxes according to who ordered them—beef teriyaki for himself, something made out of at least fifteen exotic vegetables for Sherlock, rice for both of them, and both fortune cookies for himself (Sherlock's already guessed what they say, anyway). "Dinner's ready," he announces, making himself comfortable on the couch next to Sherlock's feet. The feet don't stay there for long, though, as Sherlock shifts around to lean heavily on John's shoulder.

"You're too heavy to lean," John complains, but goes with the flow as he realizes what Sherlock wants, and vaguely he wonders how much the Scotland Yarders would pay to see John Watson and Sherlock Holmes cuddling on a couch with takeaway.

He wraps an arm around the detective's shoulders, awkwardly maneuvering the chopsticks with his free hand. "Eat," he admonished Sherlock. "You need protein." Sherlock's response is to lean forward slightly and snag a piece of beef from John's chopsticks, which strikes him as so startlingly domestic that he absolutely has to laugh.

"Food fairies have delivered," Sherlock remarks drowsily, lounging back. He eats a few more bites, but not much, and soon has turned his full attention to John's hair, running his long, capable fingers through the short military cut.

John bites his fortune cookie in half. The message inscribed on the tiny piece of low-quality paper is _You will find happiness in the simplest of things. _He doesn't bother holding it up for Sherlock to see—the detective has long since memorized every fortune that comes out of whatever cookie factory the local Chinese restaurant orders from.

Sherlock eats the remaining crumbs of Styrofoam-like cookie directly from John's hand. "Tastes better than pizza," he remarks, then waits expectantly.

John allows the silence to drag on several minutes before he grants Sherlock the answer he's clearly looking for. "Fine. So do you."

Sherlock smiles in satisfaction and takes the chopsticks from John's hand, laying them gently on the coffee table before gently repositioning John's head so their lips can meet without obstruction. "Anderson's deodorant would taste better than _that _pizza."

"Yes, Sherlock, thank you _very _much for ruining the moment," John gripes.

"It's not ruined," Sherlock insists, and proves it by kissing John again.

"The whole flat still smells like burn."

"Open a window. No, not now! Stay here."

"You're insufferable."

"You suffer me."

"That I do, Sherlock. That I do."


End file.
